Specific kinds of vehicles are often transferred to a trim shop of a vehicle body conveyer line. As the processes within the trim shop take an excessive amount of time, a space is typically left either within, before, or after a line of vehicles on the conveyor line to account for this excessive time. This space is known as an empty pitch.
In order for an automobile company to produce a completed vehicle, various processes, from a selection of material to assembly of the vehicle, are needed. Furthermore, various efforts to increase productivity through factory automation and efficient use of facilities are continuously being made. In order to facilitate increased productivity, automobile companies ascertain stock management and production sequence data by determining production schedules according to consumers' vehicle purchase orders.
This production sequence data is then used to send vehicles that have been painted in a paint shop, and stored in painted body storage (PBS), to a trim shop, where various components are coupled to the vehicle body. That is, the painted vehicles are stored in the PBS until they are required by the trim shop, as based on the trim shop's work load, according to commands of a PBS controller.
However, if specific types of vehicles are continuously required by the trim shop, work time in a specific process may substantially increase, thereby causes a stoppage of the production line. In order to prevent such stoppage, when specific type's of vehicles are continuously input into the trim line, an empty pitch P (i.e., an empty seat) is left within a line of vehicles, before a line of vehicles, or after a line of vehicles.
Typically, if a PBS operator notices many vehicles being transferred to the trim shop, the PBS operator informs a worker of the same, via a wire communication, and the worker inputs an order into a trim line controller to insert an empty pitch whenever a corresponding vehicle is transferred to the trim shop. However, if the worker erroneously omits to input the order for leaving an empty pitch, a possibility of a production line stoppage still exists. Accordingly, it is difficult to effectively perform line management of the trim shop and maintain work equalization in the trim shop.
The information disclosed in this Background of the Invention section is only for enhancement of understanding of the background of the invention and should not be taken as an acknowledgement or any form of suggestion that this information forms the prior art that is already known to a person skilled in the art.